i.
“Thinking about something”: Be Scofield, “Tech Bro Guru: Inside the Sedona Cult of Bentinho
Massaro,” The Guru Magazine, December 26, 2018, https://gurumag.com/tech-bro-guru-inside-the-
sedona-cult-of-bentinho-massaro/.
“tech bro guru”: Be Scofield, “Tech Bro Guru: Inside the Sedona Cult of Bentinho Massaro,” Integral
World, December 26, 2018, http://www.integralworld.net/scofield8.html.
quack spiritual consortium: Jesse Hyde, “When Spirituality Goes Viral,” Playboy, February 18, 2019,
https://www.playboy.com/read/spirituality-goes-viral.
social media interactions contribute to depression, anxiety, and suicide: David D. Luxton, Jennifer D.
June, and Jonathan M. Fairall, “Social Media and Suicide: A Public Health Perspective,” American
Journal of Public Health (May 2012), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3477910/.
the cult of social media attention: Oscar Schwartz, “My Journey into the Dark, Hypnotic World of a
Millennial Guru,” Guardian, January 9, 2020,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/09/strange-hypnotic-world-millennial-guru-bentinho-
massaro-youtube.
ii.
“the evils of the Internet”: Mark Dery, “Technology Makes Us Escapist; The Cult of the Mind,” New
York Times Magazine, September 28, 1997,
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/28/magazine/technology-makes-us-escapist-the-cult-of-the-
mind.html.
“Spiritual predators? Give me a break”: Josh Quittner, “Life and Death on the Web,” Time, April 7,
1997, http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,986141,00.html.
“modern-day campfire”: Alain Sylvain, “Why Buying Into Pop Culture and Joining a Cult Is
Basically the Same Thing,” Quartz, March 10, 2020, https://qz.com/1811751/the-psychology-behind-
why-were-so-obsessed-with-pop-culture/.
the word “influencer”: Jane Solomon, “What Is An ‘Influencer’ And How Has This Word Changed?”
Dictionary.com, January 6, 2021,
https://www.dictionary.com/e/influencer/#:~:text=The%20word%20influencer%20has%20been,
wasn't%20a%20job%20title.
“if Buddha or Jesus lived today”: Jesse Hyde, “When Spirituality Goes Viral,” Playboy, February 18,
2019, https://www.playboy.com/read/spirituality-goes-viral.
quotegrams: Sophie Wilkinson, “Could Inspirational Quotes Be Instagram’s Biggest Invisible Cult?,”
Grazia, September 30, 2015, https://graziadaily.co.uk/life/real-life/inspirational-quotes-instagrams-
biggest-invisible-cult/.
controversial New Age circle called Ramtha: Lisa Pemberton, “Behind the Gates at Ramtha’s
School,” Olympian, July 15, 2013, https://www.theolympian.com/news/local/article25225543.html.
the correlation between intelligence and belief in “weird ideas”: M. Shermer and J. S. Gould, Why
People Believe Weird Things (New York: A. W. H. Freeman/Owl Book, 2007).
“immune to superstition”: Stuart A Vyse, Believing in Magic: the Psychology of Superstition (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1997).
the term “conspirituality”: Charlotte Ward and David Voas, “The Emergence of Conspirituality.”
Taylor & Francis, Journal of Contemporary Religion, January 7, 2011,